Jessica
Kaye in Inheritance (2017) in 720p
Dakota
Johnson and Tilda Swinton in A Bigger Splash
(2015) in 1080hd
Johnson
Swinton
Catherine
McCormack in Shadow of the Vampire (2000) in
1080hd
I love a strange-off. Remember in
"Illuminata", when Ben Gazzara turned in such a
profoundly deranged performance that Christopher
Walken wasn't the strangest guy in the movie? Walken
lost the only strange-off of his career. Kind of
like a watershed in film history.
Well John Malkovich met his own Waterloo in this
movie! Malkovich, another of the masters of
strangeness, was weird, but he wasn't even close to
Willem Dafoe. Dafoe was so strange that he may now
be the reigning king.
The premise is fascinating. Can you remember if you
have ever seen any scenes from the 1922 German
expressionist masterpiece Nosferatu? You probably
have. It was a rip-off of Stoker's Dracula, because
Stoker's estate wouldn't sell the rights to his
story, and it was one of the first vampire flicks
ever made. They always show clips from it in film
history documentaries. I've never seen the movie,
but I've seen the clips several dozen
times.
For nearly a century, people have wondered how in
the world the lead actor, Max Schreck, managed to
look so creepy in the role. It is positively
brilliant how they created the impression of
Nosferatu so long ago, with the narrow mouth and the
rat teeth, and the pointed ears, and long
fingernails, and so forth. This guy looked really
creepy. Well, this movie posits the hypothetical
answer. There was no Max Schreck. The director (F.W.
Murnau, played by Malkovich) was so in love with his
movie realism that he hired a real vampire to play
the part of an actor playing a vampire.
So how do you pay a real vampire? You let him devour
the beautiful leading lady after the filming is
over!
Talk about an over-the-top premise.
It's total nonsense, of course, there was a real Max
Shreck, and he acted for another decade or more in
non-vampire films, while the real Greta Schroder
worked in one more picture, noticeably still alive.
But ignore all that. This movie gives you a much
more interesting explanation. The concept is
basically played for very dark humor, not serious
drama.
The director gets upset when the vampire devours his
photographer, so he confronts him and asks him, "If
you just have to feed, why eat somebody essential
like the photographer? Why not just devour the
script girl?" The vampire's answer? "I'll eat her
later." When the non-plussed director has to
fly to Berlin to get a new photographer, he tells
the vampire not to eat any more crew members, and
Nosferatu replies, "I've come to the conclusion that
once the filming is started, we really don't need a
writer any more, forcing the director to admit,
albeit reluctantly and regretfully, that writers are
actually necessary.
You get the idea.
I know it sounds kinda dumb, but they manage to pull
this off simply because everybody really gets into
the creative and loony premise, and the film is only
90 minutes long, so it never overstays its
welcome. The whole production is an actor's dream
filled with drug frenzies, flesh-eating,
larger-than-life leading ladies, and temperamental
artists. Willem Dafoe must have practiced for months
in front of a mirror to get his role down, because
he absolutely nailed Max Schreck. They cut in some
real footage from the original Nosferatu, and they
also created new black-and-white footage with Dafoe,
and you simply can't tell when Dafoe ends and Shreck
begins. But Dafoe is not the only one with a chance
to go over the top. Virtually every role allows the
actor his or her moment in the sun - er, darkness -
and every one of them chews the scenery. It's a
group of actors just having fun, while we get to
watch with quizzical looks on our faces,
intermingled with an occasional scare and an
occasional belly laugh.
Catherine
McCormack in Dangerous Beauty (1998) in 1080hd
Dangerous Beauty is based on the
actual diaries of a 16th century Venetian woman
(named Veronica Franco) who become a courtesan when
unable to make a successful marriage in Renaissance
Venice. Much of the dialogue is based on the actual
diaries and other contemporaneous documents.
It's an excellent film, a sweeping historical
adventure faithful to the dress, manners, and social
interaction of the time. The storyline includes
several satisfying twists, and some of the most
unlikely ones, like a single courtesan's bedroom
diplomacy being able to alter the fate of Europe, or
her subsequent rescue from the Inquisition, all
really happened.
The film visual appeal is as strong as the script.
The cinematography is a visual treasure in greens
and golds, and Catherine McCormack is radiant and
charismatic in the lead. McCormack seems to think of
herself as a character actress, and often hides her
looks underneath wigs and layers of make-up, but she
pulled off the leading role in this film with
lustrous beauty and plenty of swagger, so much so
that her performance here made me wonder why she
never became a bigger star.
It's kind of a chick-flick, written by a woman based
on the diaries of another woman, but the fact that
it exposes the restricted opportunities for women of
that time period doesn't mean that men can't enjoy
it. I love it because it's a great yarn, told with
real style.
Madeleine
Stowe and Patricia Healy in China Moon (1994) in
1080hd
Stowe
Healy
This flick is basically the
low-rent Body Heat, a noir with multiple twists and
double-crosses, sex, sultry Florida nights and a
wife (Madeleine Stowe) who figures out a way to free
herself of her rich asshole husband by seducing a
lovesick maroon (Ed Harris) and persuading him to
get rid of the husband's body for her. This time the
patsy is not a dumb horny lawyer, but rather a smart
horny cop who gets blindsided by people he trusts.
Unfortunately, China Moon is not in the same league
as Body Heat, but merely in the same genre. It's
nothing more than a workmanlike, serviceable noir
for genre addicts. The only really interesting
mystery involves wondering to what degree Madeleine
Stowe is a victim and to what degree she is the
manipulator. Frankly, you won't really care that
much because China Moon lacks the great strengths
that make Body Heat an excellent movie. There is no
clever dialogue, the characters aren't very
well-rounded, and the acting skills are restricted
solely to the two leads. Stowe is sexy enough in the
lead role, and Ed Harris is good, as always, but the
murdered husband has a sillier southern accent than
Foghorn Leghorn, and a young Benicio del Toro is
particularly embarrassing in a stilted and painfully
clumsy performance as Harris' rookie partner.
The film was originally shot in 1991 and shelved for
three years before it was released. That will tell
you that the studio wasn't high on its prospects.
They were right to be worried. It did
virtually nothing at the box and disappeared into
pay cable hell, where it pops up occasionally to
this day.
Melanie
Griffith and Shannah Laumeister in Nobody's Fool
(1994) in 720p
Griffith
Laumeister
Dana
Delany in Light Sleeper (1992) in 1080hd
It's Willem Dafoe again. This
time he plays a drug dealer with style and panache,
and no habit. He only provides home delivery
services to the very rich. (He's just the delivery
boy for the upscale drug kingpin, or rather
queenpin, played by Susan Sarandon.)
Dana Delany plays his former lover who wants him to
stay away from her at all costs. We are led to think
it is because she has moved on to a good new life
away from dope dealers, but it turns out she has a
dark secret to keep from him. There's also a murder
mystery in there somewhere, and a psychic, and ...
and it's a disappointingly draggy movie, with very
little edge or suspense, considering the talent
involved (Susan Sarandon, Dafoe, Delany, and
director Paul Schrader).
It's not a bad movie, really, and it's performed
well, but it's mostly about Dafoe and Sarandon
planning a life after drug dealing. Sarandon wants
to start a line of natural cosmetics. Tedious, eh?
You'd expect more from Shrader, the author of such
cinema classics as Taxi Driver, Raging Bull, and the
Last Temptation of Christ. Of course, in all three
of those cases, Schrader's script was brought to
life by a certain diminutive genius named Scorsese.
Schrader's best films as a director are probably
this film, Blue Collar, Hardcore and The Comfort of
Strangers, all of which are far below the quality of
the Scorsese collaborations.
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